Chris Selley: No ideologues remain in the Conservative caucus

No ideologues remain in the Conservative caucus

It is time to retire the word “ideological” from Canada’s political lexicon. It doesn’t seem to mean anything anymore. In recent weeks, Tony Clement, a Conservative cabinet minister, has chided NDP leader Thomas Mulcair for “taking an ideological approach” to oil-sands development; Prime Minister Stephen Harper has deplored the New Democrats’ “ideological aversion to trade”; various New Democrats have accused the Conservatives of being “ideological” for their plans to contract out post-office services, eliminate Canada Revenue Agency counter service, cut funding for scientific research and limit health-care benefits for refugee claimants, which Liberal critic Kevin Lamoureux also deplored as “ideological.” Interim Liberal leader Bob Rae denounced the Conservatives’ entire “wrong-headed ideological agenda” — which is apparently “hidden” in various places around Ottawa, though he and Mr. Mulcair seem to have no difficulty discerning how awful and ideological it is.

I wonder how evocative the word “ideological” is to people who aren’t political junkies. Is it so bad, so uncommon, to have — as the Oxford dictionary defines it — “a system of ideas or way of thinking” that one regards “as justifying actions, especially one that is held implicitly or adopted as a whole and maintained regardless of the course of events”?

Among political junkies, the term is sometimes — though not always (see above) — meant to imply pigheaded rigidity. For a Canadian politician, that’s very bad. Weirdly, it’s also very bad when a Canadian politician changes his mind — the dreaded “flip-flop.” But is there any politician in Ottawa anywhere near power who can usefully be described as consistently ideological? Since the Reform days, Mr. Harper and his mates have been on a public policy magical mystery tour. Now they say whatever they need to say on Friday, contradict it completely on Monday, and think nothing of it. To call them ideological is to miss an opportunity to call them shameless hypocrites.

The most useful distinction between the Liberals of yore and the modern Conservatives is one of tone, not ideology. Take Citizenship and Immigration Minister Jason Kenney’s cuts to refugee health care, for example.

That’s something the Liberals probably wouldn’t have done, even if they thought it was a good idea. They were notoriously skittish on the refugee and immigration files. But when things got dire enough to necessitate action — closing the U.S. border to inbound refugee claimants; slapping a tourist visa on a friendly nation — they massaged facts and soft-pedalled their language in hopes of not offending immigrants or left-leaning voters. Mr. Kenney also massages facts, then shoots from the hip in hopes of appealing to all potential Conservative voters.

“Our Conservative government strongly disagrees with the irresponsible Liberal and NDP policy that illegal immigrants and bogus asylum seekers under deportation orders who refuse to leave Canada should be able to abuse our fair immigration system and receive gold-plated healthcare benefits that are more generous than Canadian taxpayers, including seniors and Kevin Lamoureux’s constituents, receive,” Mr. Kenney’s spokeswoman told CBC this week. “If [he] consulted with Canadians, he would find that these long overdue changes, which ensure the system is fair, are supported by Canadians from coast to coast to coast.”

It’s not just “bogus asylum seekers” — another meaningless term that begs for retirement — being cut off. But I suspect Mr. Kenney is quite right that he has broad-based support, among immigrants as much as non-immigrants. Why should a refugee claimant have “superior” access to health care than you or me? There are reasonable answers to the question — but not many that are as short, sharp or incitant as Mr. Kenney’s.

Is he pursuing an “ideological” agenda on migration? If so, it’s tough to tell what the ideology is. We keep letting in more immigrants, and he keeps bragging about it. In his efforts to expedite the refugee system, and deter asylum-shoppers and weak claimants from rolling the dice, he is behaving in a more-benevolent-than-mainstream fashion by the standards of Western nations. You might reasonably think denying free dentistry and prescription drugs to claimants is a bit bloody-minded; this government has had its mean streaks. But that’s not an accusation of ideology; it’s an accusation of bastardliness. It’s not good to be bastardly. Why let them off the hook with “ideological”?

Mr. Harper and some other leading Conservatives were certainly ideological, once upon a time. But surely an ideologue is as an ideologue does. Those Conservatives have governed for six years in a way that goes almost entirely contrary to those preferences. If they can be described as “ideological,” then literally anyone can.

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